In the cemetery's crumbling chapel, moonlight bled through stained glass in droplet patterns. Layne knelt on rotting rose petals, velvet box open to reveal the serpentine silver ring—its wolf-eye inlaid with shattered vampire iris crystals glowing sickly violet.
"Three centuries asleep on Silverfang matriarchs' fingers," his breath ghosted over her old ring indent, "awaiting Moonflare's heir."
As Alyssa touched the band, Moonflare recoiled into marrow as a panicked hatchling. She glimpsed Layne's sleeve-shadowed hand oozing black ichor where the silver box had scorched him.
"Too tight." She twisted the ring, but cold metal constricted into flesh. Scraping sounds rose beneath the altar, like claws on silver-sealed coffins.
Layne's chuckle startled ravens roosting on crosses: "First time always hurts, like..." He bit his tongue, smearing blood on the wolf-eye. "...the Embrace."
Moonlight shifted. Saintly stained glass morphed into vampire lords' profiles. Moonflare hawk surged toward the ring, only to rebound as silver burns. Layne sucked her seared wrist, tongue bristles scraping blood.
"Not common silver," he licked crimson lips, pupils flickering between human and vampiric. "Melted with the first Wolf Queen's ashes."
Chains snapped in the crypt. Alyssa crouched to adjust her hem. The ring's shadow didn't cast a wolf—but a 13th-century vampire prince's seal. Moonflare phoenix erupted, tail feathers revealing Layne's phantom wings in stained glass.
"Father demands the wedding." She smiled as the ring trembled on his finger.
Layne's pulse skipped thrice beneath her palm, gray veins surfacing: "Then at Blood Moon..."
Kane's arrow shattered glass. Moonlight swords pierced Layne's guise. The wolf-eye crystal cracked, exposing a fang inside—identical to Kane's ear cuff crest.